Olympic organisers will delay sending tickets to Libya's Olympic committee until closer to London 2012, it has emerged, as the government insisted no one with links to the Gaddafi regime will be allowed into the country.

The government moved to dampen speculation that despots from other regimes may see the Games as a PR opportunity, insisting it will have the final say over who is allowed entry to the UK.

The decision to delay distribution of the "hundreds" of tickets allocated to the Libyan Olympic committee will spark debate over how to treat other potentially embarrassing visitors to the Games.

Robert Mugabe is subject to a Europe-wide travel ban but the prospect of rulers of Middle Eastern nations such as Syria and Bahrain, accused of brutally supressing pro-democracy demonstrations, attending the Games will be dealt with on a "case by case basis", the government has said.

The fact that one of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's sons, Muhammad al-Gaddafi, is head of the country's Olympic committee had raised concerns that both may try and enter Britain for the Games.

But it is understood that every competing country that has been allocated tickets – a list that includes Zimbabwe, Burma, Yemen, Bahrain and Syria – will have to submit a list of every recipient. The Home Office has the power to stop any individual entering the country.

"Gaddafi, his son and key figures in the current Libyan government are banned from entering the EU and will not be coming to the Olympic Games," said a spokeswoman for the Department of Culture, Media and Sport.

"As with all national organising committees, the Libyan NOC, not an individual, has been allocated a few hundred tickets which they are responsible for distributing to sports organisations and athletes within their country. Every international visitor is subject to the UK's immigration controls and will be refused entry if they don't meet the rules."

Zimbabwe has appointed an official reseller to distribute its tickets to members of the public.

David Cameron's spokesman said it was "a decision for the IOC, not for us" which tickets were allocated to Libya.

"The fact is that Gaddafi, his family and key members of that regime are subject to a travel ban and won't be allowed to travel here to the Olympics in any event," said the spokesman for the prime minister.

The International Olympic Committee has continually reiterated that all competing countries should be allocated tickets. The IOC president, Jacques Rogge, refused to intervene when challenged about al-Gaddafi's Olympic position.

At the SportAccord conference in London in April, he said: "At no point have we had any complaint of misbehaviour or bad conduct about the son of Mr Gaddafi." The IOC would do all it could to facilitate the involvement of Libyan athletes in the Games, Rogge said.

The size of each country's allocation is based on its population, Olympic performance and the historic popularlity of specific events. About 1m of the total of 8.8m tickets are reserved for overseas distribution.

While the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games has told competing nations how many tickets they have been allocated, they will not be printed and disitributed until well into next year.

Rogge told the sports minister Hugh Robertson, who was in Lausanne on Wednesday as part of a working group on corruption in sport, that in the specific case of Libya, the IOC and London organisers would delay distribution of the tickets altogether until the situation was clearer.